Starting a priest
So you want to be a Priest? Priests are healers. They are responsible for the staying power of any high-end group, and their job can be thankless, but it is essential, and most experienced players realize this. As a priest, you have a little less versatility than some of the other classes, but when things get hairy, you'll have your hands so full you won't even realize it. If you're considering playing a priest, you'll have to ask yourself a few questions, first: * Do I mind taking up a caster role, in the back of the fight, as a low DPS class? * If I'm going to do PVP, am I comfortable with the pressure of frequently being the #1 target? * Can I think quickly, and handle a large set of hotkeys in the process of getting my job done? * Do I mind the pressure of being the most indispensible member of a group? * Do I subsequently not mind the fact that I may not get a lot of attention or glory in this role? These are all things a priest will deal with, and if you've played one you're familiar with this. It's not a very standard role, and it shows because not a lot of people play a priest. Still, it has its advantages, including your immense popularity when people need to set up a group (this will also be the peak of your popularity, by the way, as once the group wipes, you get the blame too), and a lot of respect from power-gamers if you do your job well. Races The first thing to consider with a priest is what race to make them. The following races can play a priest: * Alliance ** Dwarves ** Humans ** Night Elves * Horde ** Trolls ** Undead When choosing a race for your priest, there are a few things to consider. The first is their racial spells. Each race of priest gets 2 race-specific spells, presumably explained by the fact that they worship different deities. Each race also has their own starting areas, some of which tend to be more or less congested based on the popularity of the race. You probably won't want to decide your race based on how easy the early levels will be, but you probably *will* want to consider your leveling strategy based on this, especially if you're starting on a new server. In the end, though, personal taste should be the greatest factor. One race may make a better priest now, but as is the nature of MMORPGs, balancing a game is a continual process, and things can change. The following is a breakdown of the different races. Human Humans start at Northshire Abbey near Goldshire and Stormwind. * Desperate Prayer - ( 10th level quest ) Desperate Prayer is an instant, self-only healing spell. It is a zero mana spell and has a cooldown of 30 minutes. The amount of healing will increase as you level. Dwarf Priests also get this identical spell. * Feedback - ( 20th level ) This gives a proc on your weapon which transfers +X mana from the mob to the Priest and does +X (same as mana) damage add on your weapon strike. Night Elf All the Night Elves start in Shadowglen for 1-5, which is home to Aldrassil, where the trainers and vendors are, and then move through Dolanaar, your base for 5-10, then on to Darnassus and hence to Kalimdor for 10 and up leveling. * Starshards - Acquired from a 10th level quest which is a channelled DOT spell. It has multiple levels which increase the damage per hit and the duration needed to channel. ** 10th level is 18 damage 4 times. ** 18th level is 27 damage 5 times etc. * Elune's Grace - Acquired at 20th level, a buff which does damage reduction on ranged attacks. -X damage from ranged attacks for 3 minutes. It is self-cast only. I don't know if this affects spells or only missile (bow/gun/thrown) type weapons. I will be 20th soon and will then find out -- Dga This spell doesn't reduce large amounts of damage and with mobs being largely melee, it doesn't have much PVE use, but in PVP against hunters it can be extremely useful. There are two notable quests where your services will be in much demand. * Cleansing of the Infected - Kill 20 rabid thistle bears. Once you get cure disease, you can help out with the party members who have become infected. Rabies is -5 Strength and -5 Agility and 50% regen rate penalty for 10 minutes. * Cave Mushrooms - This is the first quest against the Naga and it's in a cave with lots of them and so your talents as a general healer will be much in demand. Dwarf The steadfast dwarves have ever been the bedrock of the Alliance. Their mountain fortresses are marvels of stone and iron, only matched by their legendary skill in battle. The home city of Ironforge lies near the outpost of Anvilmar, which will serve as your starting point. While the dwarves are well known fighters, recent events have suggested that they have a larger part to play in the world and they have bent themselves to the task of discovering what that may be. As such, they have become masters of discovery and knowledge as often as they have become masters of the blade and warhammer. Dwarves receive two spells, 'Desperate Prayer' at level 10, and 'Fear Ward' at level 20. * Desperate Prayer - Desperate Prayer is an instant, self-only healing spell. It is a zero mana spell and has a cooldown of 30 minutes. The amount of healing will increase as you level. * Fear Ward - Fear Ward protects the friendly target against fear. The next fear effect used against the target will fail, using up the ward. Lasts 10 minutes. Undead Starting in the dreary forests of Tirisfal Glades, the Forsaken priests struggle to forge a path for themselves in their new roles. How can you be a preacher for the gods when the gods have abandoned you? From a role-playing and storyline perspective, this is a prominent factor for the Undead priest, one that does not figure much into your gameplay experience, but one that can easily make its way into how you play your character. Obviously someone is out there, because the calls of the Forsaken priests are still answered ... but by who? The Undead receive two spells, 'Touch of Weakness' at level 10, and 'Devouring Plague' at level 20. Additionally, all Undead get the advantage of the 'Will of the Forsaken' racial ability which easily dispels Fear effects and can be a life saver in tight PvP matches with other classes able to fear. Generally, Will of the Forsaken and Devouring Plague are considered the best racial traits for Horde Priests. * Touch of Weakness - Touch of Weakness is a buff that the Priest can cast upon him or herself. It lasts for 60 seconds, and once cast, imbues the next succesful melee hit with extra damage, and affects the target with a debuff that reduces their damage done by a constant amount. The amount of damage done and damage reduced increases with levels. * Devouring Plague - Devouring Plague is a Damage over Time (DoT) spell that inflicts a sizable amount of damage upon an opponent over a 24-second span of time. Every point of damage suffered by Devouring Plague is returned to the Priest in health. This makes for a very useful spell in both PVP and tough PVE encounters. The recast timer on this spell prevents it from being used frequently, so its best not to use it unless you know you're in for a tough fight. The amount of damage done by Devouring Plague improves with increased spell levels. Troll The trolls of the Darkspear tribe travelled west to Kalimdor with Thrall many years ago. They've since settled down in and around Durotar, though the desire to return to their homelands in Stranglethorn Vale still resides in the hearts of many of their ranks. The priests of the troll race serve a similar role to the shaman, that of healer and spiritual leader. Troll priests receive two spells as well, 'Hex of Weakness' at level 10, and 'Shadowguard' at level 20. These spells are somewhat weaker than the racial benefits Undead receive, however Trolls are better off in the department of aesthetics and clever players may be able to fool enemies into thinking them a Shaman through the use of Shadowguard, a spell which shares graphics with Shamans Lightning Shield. * Hex of Weakness - Hex of Weakness is an instant cast 30 yard range spell that reduces x damage done to you by the enemy for 2 minutes. This spell is similar to the Undead's level 10 spell, bar the damage and the need to hit with a meelee weapon to proc. * Shadowguard - Similar to the shaman's spell 'Lightning Shield', casting Shadowguard surrounds the priest with a force of shadow. When the priest is struck in combat, the Shadowguard hits the assailant for shadow damage. The amount of damage done by Shadowguard improves with additional spell levels. Spells For detailed info, see Priest Spells. Key Spells A priest should always use Power Word: Fortitude spell on themselves and any friends before engaging in combat. Make sure to keep this buff active. Inner Fire, obtained at level 12, is a buff that can be cast by the priest on themselves, and is useful to keep up, as it increases the amount of armor you have. Usually a priest should pull with a slow casting Direct Damage spell like Smite (Mind Blast, if there no other mobs nearby the target) at the edge of the spell's range. The next spell should usually be the Damage over Time spell, Shadow Word: Pain, before the enemy gets within melee combat range. Because it is instant cast, you can be backing up while casting it, to extend the amount of time the mob takes to get to you. As you get around 20+ level and if spent most on shadow talents along with Mind Flay, you can use Mind Flay to further slow your target down and give your DoT spell time to do its work. Early on and throughout the adventures of a priest, Power Word: Shield can be used in a fight to instantly prevent some amount of damage to a party member. Be careful to watch whether you or a party member still has a Weakened Soul debuff before you try to cast it again. Though it is not the most efficient way of healing, it is extremely useful, as it instantly absorbs damage to you or a party member. One soloing routine involves casting Power Word: Shield, then waiting until the Weakened Soul debuff times down to about 15 seconds, and then starting combat. This is so that when the mob finally breaks through your shield, the Weakened Soul would have worn off by then, giving you the option to re-shield yourself. With your shield up, you can think of using another Smite or Mind Blast, but be careful with Mind Blast. Mind Blast generates lots of aggro and in a group environment, may cause the mob to attack you instead of the tank. shield prevents spell interruption from many forms of damage, and will help you (or another spellcaster in your party) cast a spell. You can use Renew (a Heal over Time spell), if you or your party member has more than 75% health, but probably a Lesser Heal if less than that. Talents At level 10, every class begins to accrue what are called 'Talent Points'. You can apply these points instantly to your character by accessing the 'Talent' menu, which becomes accessible upon reaching level 10. For a look at the Priest talents and how they interact, you can generally head over to The WoWVault Talent Tool. You can also look at other players' preferred talent layouts for an idea of how you may want to build your own priest. Of course, you may want to build your priest in your own way, in which case you may still want to look at this to at least help yourself plan things out. Priests receive talents in three different trees: * Shadow - These represent the darker side of priesthood. The shadow talents focus largely on increasing a priest's damage output through his or her Shadow spells. Specializing in shadow talents lends towards a more solo approach to the game, as a shadow priest's abilities don't generally stack well with teammates; particularly in large PVP environments or tough instanced dungeons where priests are generally in short-demand and needed for their superior ability to act as a healer. This should not be taken to understand that a Shadow Priest cannot live up to the task however which is quite possible. Many players will specialize in shadow talents up to level 55-60, and then switch to a Holy/Discipline hybrid. As a starting point it may be helpful to invest your first 5 points into Spirit Tap, then Improved Shadow Word: Pain followed by 3 points into Blackout, then get Mindflay and then 5/5 in Mind Blast. After this for leveling purposes either getting Improved Power Word: Shield from the discipline tree is an option or going down the path to Shadowform. * Discipline - The discipline spells focus on inner strength, boosting a priest's mana, improving their buff spells significantly, etc. Many Discipline talents are very useful no matter what you specialize in, particularly the 'Improved Power Word: Shield' talent, which reduces the length of time you must wait before casting another shield by half to a total time of 15 seconds. Additionally for end game healing the Discipline tree provides talents which allows a percentage mana regeneration to continue while casting, a talent to increase maximum spirit, a talent to cast a spell free of mana and a talent to maximize total mana by up to 10%. * Holy - Holy talents are vital to maximizing your efficiency as a healer, which is why most high-level priests elect to focus on these talents. It is a general consensus however that the end tree talents of the holy tree are not worth the talent points required to get them and hence many priests up to specialize into holy to include inspiration, subtelty and possibly Improved Flash Heal or Improved Prayer of Healing. The holy line improves your healing power, lowers the mana cost of heals, and reduces the casting time of some healing spells. There is more to the holy line, too, so you may want to look through the aforementioned The WoWVault Talent Tool to get a full look. Talent discussion Use this space to editorialize about different talent builds. There's a lot of discussion about priest builds, so it can't hurt to put some overviews of the discussion here. Useful Professions Primary Professions * Tailoring : Tailoring is immediately useful to a priest, they can wear the cloth armor they make. * Skinning : Skinning is a very good choice for Priests new to the game as it allows them to gather up leather to sell at the Auction House from their prey killed while leveling. While not useful to the Priest directly the money is scorned by no one and it may be useful for the Priest to spend several seconds out of combat resting as mana regeneration only begins 5 seconds after a succesful spellcast. Hence this time would not be wasted. * Herbalism and Alchemy : Even if, as a caster, the Priest can rely on his own abilities to heal and buff himself, additional potions are always welcome. * Enchanting : Although not specifically good for a Priest, the many items a Priest can't use can be made useful with Disenchant to provide reagents for enchanting. At higher levels and in guilds, enchanting can be both profitable and sought after. Tailoring can compliment enchanting by supplying items to disenchant. * Engineering : Engineering will not make you money, from my humble experience in WoW few professions are truely good at that. Blacksmithing may be one however it is utterly useless to priests and sadly enough the high level tailoring recipies which might be useful to priests are outclassed by class sets which may be easier to attain. Engineering offers a wide array of trinkets which the priest can use in order to help himself in 1v1 or even group player versus player fights such as a Net-o-Magic, Mind control cap, Death ray and others. Secondary Professions * First Aid : First Aid is for the true healer types. It can be a very useful way to enhance your role as a healer while preserving mana. Useful mainly in emergencies, when your party wiped and you do not wish to use the mana to heal yourself as you need it to resurrect fallen party members. * Cooking : Like First Aid, Cooking further solidifies your role, but as a buffer. Some higher recipes offer significant boosts to Spirit and Stamina. And for the buff-happy, making a cozy fire in the middle of the area where you will be pulling a large number of mobs can give that extra special fuzzy feeling to your group's destruction. While these skills contribute very little relative to the other buffs and heals you provide, they go a long way in making the impression with your group that you are serious about your role. What else? Running out of ideas and time at the moment. Feel free to include anything else a possible priest may want to consider in the creation and early progression of their priest. ---- Priest,Starting Priest,Starting